The true state of affairs, of course, spread round the whole school in half an hour, and public opinion dubbed Lesbia a trump. Among the juniors especially her decision raised her to the height of popularity. Jess and Gwennie were ready to grovel at her feet. "You'll find us all positive _angels_ next term," they assured her. "Well, hardly that, I expect," laughed Lesbia. "Still, I dare say we'll understand each other rather better, and you'll try to behave in class without making me turn absolute gorgon to keep you in order, won't you?" "Gorgon indeed! You're a _dear_!" gushed Gwennie. "An absolute sport!" agreed Jess, linking her arm affectionately in that of her new-found idol. CHAPTER XX The Highway Woman Easter came as a blessed pause in the rush and turmoil of school life. The round of work at Kingfield High had seemed even more arduous to Lesbia in the Sixth than it had been in VA. The form was supposed to be grinding for the Matric, and though only its brightest specimens, Regina, Carrie, and Kathleen, and two wobbly candidates, Aldora and Cissie, were to be offered up as victims to the educational sacrifice, it meant that everybody, clever, mediocre, or dull, had to toil through the same textbooks and write identical exercises. Miss Pratt, who had gone up with the Sixth from VA, considerably to Lesbia's sorrow, constituted herself a kind of intellectual razor to sharpen the wits of the form, and had scant mercy on those who fell short of her standard. Lesbia sometimes, squashed flat by a sarcasm, felt she was metaphorically placed on a stool with a dunce's cap on her head. She tried to keep pace with the matriculation candidates, but her swimming brains often got confused, and, as she was a venturesome guesser, she was occasionally guilty of coming out with "howlers". Everybody seemed to welcome this particular Easter, even "the blessed Damozel", who, despite her poetic appearance, was the form's champion worker. The hard grind had perhaps accentuated her resemblance to Rossetti's heroine, for a slight paleness etherealized her, the intellectual concentration made her great grey eyes shine as the chief feature in her face, and her hair, which fortunately never seemed to darken, was still "yellow like ripe corn". Regina was really growing very pretty, and though she had not yet dropped her jerky angular manner, she was much less gauche than she had been a year ago, and promised to develop into an interesting personality. "She's the sort of girl who may possibly do _anything_ after she leaves school," commented Calla one day, when the girls were discussing absent members. "Yes. With those brains it's just what she takes it into her head to concentrate on," agreed Laura. "She _might_ make a hit on the stage." "No, no! Not with those queer manners."